Zone Conference #2

      We met with the Union Zone for our next
 Zone Conference.
*note, please see the previous post
Zone Conference #1 for
more specific details about our
focus and teachings together.

Ok, we were trying to figure out how to hold

our Books of Mormon.

We came up with this..

This was so funny. We had given the assignment for 

every missionary to eat breakfast before they came,

and to bring a bottle of water to drink during the day. 

We started each zone conference by seeing who had been

 obedient to our request, even though it was so simple.

 I began each of our zone conferences by

asking each missionary if they had eaten breakfast, 

and then if they said yes, I asked them what they had eaten.

(very enlightening), and if they

had remembered to bring a bottle of water.

If they did not eat breakfast, or remember to bring water,

I had the Elders come up and give me 10 push ups

and the Sisters give me 10 deep knee bends.

This zone had the most Elders not eat breakfast, or bring

a water bottle, and they were blown completely away, 

that I seriously had them come up and give me 10! 

poor Elder Vazquez :) couldn't quit laughing, 

and sweet Elder and Sister Ortega did some stretches.

 I did deep knee bends with Sister Marciano,
 just to keep her company.
                                                  

Zone Leaders Elder Uribe and Elder Gamez did an 

outstanding job preparing for this conference.

This is our largest zone, and they had everything

ready to go and their presentation was excellent.

The zone leaders creative idea of

feeling the weight of our calling

as missionaries.

What will it take to go further?  

What motivates us to stay the course and 

remain focused, and on task?

They asked Elder Perez to hold his area book.

Then they added other area books

from his district and zone.

The second time, they added their zone banner to help

him focus on his purpose and responsibility as a missionary.

Presidents game

President had everyone go outside to play a game he calls 

azucar and aguacate (sugar and avocado), 

which is his remake of the old fashioned game, candy and caster oil.

These missionaries had a ball!  It was so fun 

 to watch them listen carefully to President as he called, 

either azucar or aguacate, and then run

this way or that way trying to tag someone to 

come join their side.  As we came back inside, 

 President related this experience, to our daily work

 and goals here in the mission.  

Look at the Sisters vs the Elders ready position. 

Once again, President taught,

As we focus on something good; 

when we work as a team, and as we stay motivated; 

there is simply not time for anything else.  We do not have

time for problems, or distractions, for immodest thoughts,

or for disobedience and selfishness.  This work requires all

of our righteous, focused efforts. 

Some pictures throughout our day together.

I loved that they gathered together to lead 

and sing this song.

Bless these sweethearts. I love them all so much!

 Elder and Sister Loza on the right, are

our autosuficiencia couple who came and shared

the day with our new matrimony couple

Elder and Sister Ortega, even though they are in the

Independencia zone.  They are practicing singing and

leading the hymn I am a Child of God.

The zone leaders object lesson

Elder Gamez did a great job with this object lesson

notice as he wipes his finders on Sister Rodriguez's plate,

adding to the effectively gross serving...

He looks pretty pleased with himself.

Practicing inviting others to be baptized.

Great day together!

Our 8th Zone Conference was with the Lomas Zone.
We Sisters snapped a quick picture together before we got started.

The Lomas Zone with outstanding

zone leaders  Elder Sosa and Elder Salinas.

What a great zone. 

Have you noticed

how many outstanding sisters 

are serving here in this zone? :)

Presidents opening remarks

I talked about what is at stake with

our early morning personal scripture study.

How is it our source of strength?

How does it set the tone for our day?

What kind of spiritual power can our early

 morning efforts give to us?

The assistants object lesson with Elder Ramirez holding

a missionary plank.  He held it for 3:17 the first time.

The second time, as he had their zone banner across is back,

he held his missionary plank for 4:05.  

As they talked to him afterwards, he said, he was

focusing on 'who was my God, and who it was

that gave me my strength'.

He was wiped out afterwards.

President's game

This was a fun group.  They really got into this game.

President Clayton

5 things I would like you to remember

1. In this mission, baptism is our goal and our purpose.
   Baptism is a part of conversion.  Numbers tell us where we are and where we are going.

   We are not looking for numbers, we are looking for souls.

2. Baptism is central to the Doctrine of Christ.

   We invite others to be baptized, we do not challenge them to be baptized.
   Baptism is a commandment, not a suggestion.

3. We are looking for people, for souls, not numbers.

4. Miracles come from our faith, faith does not come because of miracles

  We must have faith sufficient to find those seeking for truth.
  Begin each day with hope that you are going to find the individuals the Lord desires you to find

5. We must do this work with love, with expectations and with hope.  

This work of Salvation is a work of love and joy.

Introducing our 5 stations for our picnic lunch

Giving a quick reminder of how to iron 

a missionary white shirt.

Going through all the stations as they gathered

their picnic.

ironing and more ironing

reciting our new scripture to President

getting those buttons sewed on.

reciting more scriptures

more sewing and ironing

Looking over area books

Zone Leaders Elder Sosa and Elder Salinas looking over 

their notes before teaching.

Great day together!

Our 9th and final Zone Conference!

Independencia Zone 

with zone leaders Elder Sanchez and Elder Salgado

Who did a fabulous job preparing and having things

ready to go.

not. quite. ready.

Here we go.

President's introduction

The zone leaders asked Elder Angulo to do a 

missionary plank.  He is from the Dominican

Republic and did not know what is was, the 

group explained it to him, and he got right down

on the floor and held he plank for 5:19!

Elder Sanchez and Elder Salgado did a 

wonderful job teaching.

Cute sisters

Ready for President's game

station #1 

President demonstrating 

correct hand washing and singing

 I am a Child of God.

Just a few pictures of our day together.

sewing, ironing, tying those ties and reciting

our missionary scriptures.

I love it!

I just love it!

Elder Salgado showing off the beautiful cake

to the zone, and Elder Sanchez

 bowing in the background

The zone leaders ask what piece she would like..

She is horrified at how Elder Sanchez serves her.

She was just not prepared for how that 

cake was served to her!

They are trying to tell her it is not that bad, 

and perfectly fine to eat.

She would have none of it.

The zone leaders teach the proper way

 to serve the gospel message, and invite 

others to Come Unto Christ.

Great Zone Conferences!  

Manzanillo Branch Conference

We were so thankful to attend the Manzanillo Branch Conference last Sunday.

There was just a sweet feeling there. Very few members were there when we began. Just six people were sitting in the chapel.  But slowly people started coming in. President Rios and his wife came and then the Branch President came out from an early morning meeting.  He looks so young, bless his heart.  As we had driven up, I saw his darling wife and three children getting out of a taxi in front of the chapel, those sweet children impeccably dressed for church, those two little boys in white shirts and ties and their darling little girl in a pretty pink dress and pink back pack all packed and ready.

Both his counselors came separately in, late and hurried up to the stand after the meeting had started. President Garcia told us that many of his members are late or cannot come to church at times, because they are so dependent on the buses.  Sometimes the buses do not run at all on Sunday's, and often the buses do not run on time.  They get off schedule and off their routes, with no warning, so the members who are so dependent on them cannot get to church, even if they are dressed and ready and waiting, if the buses don't come, or are late, the members miss out.
Boy, what a reminder to count my many many blessings.

But President Rios told President and I that this Manzanillo Branch always has the highest attendance at the Temple each month.  They will rent a van of some sort and come together as a Branch.  They gather together and come to the Temple.  They bring their families to wait for them outside the Temple gates, and they come, and that makes me smile.  Good for them. But their Sacrament meeting attendance is low and quite variable because of their lack of dependable transportation.

Here is President Daniel Antonio Pedraza Garcia in the center, with his 1st Counselor Gustavo Jimenez Rodriguez on the left, and his 2nd Counselor Luis Gilberto Damian Robles on the right.

President Clayton with Manzanillo District President, President Rios 

The Manzanillo Branch Presidency with
 Manzanillo District President Rios and President Clayton

President and Sister Rios 

   I loved sitting by and visiting with Sister Rios.
   What a genuine and lovely woman she is.

I am trying to take a quick picture after each conference 

for our mission history

Our Sunday School class.  

We talked about the Lamanites burying

their weapons of war. 

A quick picture with our two dedicated Elders

 serving in both the Manzanillo and Las Brisas Branches 

Elder Guerreiro, and Elder Sanchez. 

Great Missionaries both of them! 

New Zone Leader Training

Last week, our assistants brought all of the zone leaders to the mission office for an all day, overnight training.

Elder Kotter and Elder Manriquez wrote about their training.

The purpose of our training was to unite all the zone leaders together in brotherly love, to train them in their duties, and to establish a plan to carry out the vision that President Clayton has set forth. So we started off the meeting Tuesday night with a little family home evening. We had a spiritual thought, and we opened up a discussion between everyone on how we can get to “New Heights” as leaders. It was a very inspired meeting and what was felt by everyone was that, for the mission to get to new heights, we as leaders would have to, first. We each felt that the most effective way to do that was to be better followers of President Clayton ourselves, and to be more worthy in our callings, and more like unto the Savior. We compared this effort to “spiritual muscles.” Just like our body has its respected muscles that must be able to perform their functions as a whole, and they must be strengthened to magnify their purposes, our spirit is like unto a muscle as well. Our individual Christ like attributes are the muscles that we must exercise to be strengthened. Like the head of knowledge, the twin arms of faith and humility, the legs of diligence and determination, the core of desire, and the heart of love. We finished the night each pondering, and with Fanta ice cream floats.

Wednesday, with President Clayton’s approval, we started the day early with the 1st ever trimestral world cup of soccer for the Mission Mexico Guadalajara. We had four rotating teams: the north (Vallarta, Santiago, Tepic); the south (Colima, Manzanillo, Guzman); the city (Independencia, Lomas, Union); and the offices (us, and the 4 secretaries). It was a blast and we all finished very excited.

We then started talking about the “To New Heights” paper, that we had given to you and President a few weeks ago, and that we had given to the zone leaders as homework for this meeting. We talked about those focuses of Worthiness, Work, and Doctrine, and the goals that President had laid out for us about responsibility, efficiency, and training of missionaries. With those thoughts we read through the new zone leader manual with them answering any and all questions that they had about their duties. We also talked of their importance as zone leaders in the creation of this new vision for the mission.

After finishing the manual we started another council based on what plan we could make as leaders to carry out more specifically what President had taught us. The leaders put goals for themselves as zone leaders regarding the 3 focusses (responsibility, efficiency, and training of missionaries) to bring to pass the correct way of reporting daily, weekly, and monthly, to actualize the area books, member lists in their areas, and to have a district leader training in their own zones; not to the same scale that we did it, but with the same focus.

They set forth the plan to achieve all that before the next meeting that we would have in 3 months before the next zone conference.

Many of the zone leaders commented that they loved the meeting and that it was a great motivation for them to take their zones to New Heights of teaching Repentance and Baptizing Converts.